AFRIN, Syria (North Press) – Jevin Mannan, 30, a pseudonym for a woman from Afrin, north of Aleppo Governorate in northwestern Syria, never forgets the day Turkey launched an offensive against the area using the Syrian armed opposition factions.
Mannan remembers how, then, they [she and her family] went down to the basements for fear of the Turkish missiles that fell on the city’s neighborhoods.
The scenes are still stuck in the memory of Mannan. She says, “I remember women, children, and the elderly while trying to rescue their lives under the barrage of missiles.”
On Jan. 20, 2018, the Turkish forces and the armed opposition factions, known as the Syrian National Army (SNA), launched the so-called “Olive Branch” military operation to push away the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) under the pretext of protecting “Turkish national security.”
The operation caused the displacement of about 300.000 of the original inhabitants of the Kurds of Afrin who have been taking shelter in 42 villages and five camps in Aleppo northern countryside, locally known as Shahba region, since then.
There are about 16.000 displaced families from Afrin distributed over 42 villages and towns in Shahba region, in addition to 1.870 families, comprising 7.500 individuals, now living in the camps of Barkhodan, Sardam, Afrin, al-Awda, and Shahba, according to the Social Affairs and Labor Board of the Afrin region, currently operating in Aleppo northern countryside.
Kawa Hannan, 34, a pseudonym for a citizen of Afrin suffered from several methods of insult and humiliation at the hands of the militants of the SNA factions.
“They broke into my house, stole all our properties, and insulted us,” Hannan said.
In a statement released on Jan. 17, the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (AANES) said the Turkish-occupied region of Afrin represents an “existing issue” till it is liberated and its displaced original people are secured a safe return.
Shiyar Mustafa, a citizen of Afrin, said that the SNA militants looted and stole all the civilians’ properties including motorbikes, cars, furniture, stores, ……… etc.
In mid-2022, Syrians for Truth and Justice (STJ), a human rights organization, published an extensive investigative report in which it revealed details of the demographic change process implemented in Afrin and its countryside by Turkey.
The organization started its report saying, “The UN Security Council and the European Union must take a firm stance towards the implicit and coercive demographic engineering efforts across Syria. Additionally, they must ensure that humanitarian aid, reconstruction, and early recovery efforts do not turn these demographic changes into the status quo.”
The report said that the SNA factions ”have been building one of the largest human settlements in Afrin region,” clarifying that “the settlement is warranted by the Turkish authorities and is designated for housing SNA fighters and their families in Afrin, which has historically identified as a Syrian Kurdish-majority region.”